VOYAGER

Colours In The Sun SEASON OF MIST

Synth-wielding Australian prog metallers blend the hooky and the heavy.

It’s been 20 years since they formed in Perth, but on this seventh album, Voyager sound like they’re ready to become a belated overnight success. Their blend of bludgeoning riffs, sparkling synths, shuddering prog tempo-jumbles and booming choruses has never sounded more potent. Opening track Colours doesn’t mess about, launching straight into a stadium-sized chorus before the juddering uncertainty of the verse and edgy riff volleys elsewhere suggest more circumspect emotions are at work. They rock just as hard and heavy on Reconnected, on the back of pummelling thrash and epically emotive melodic strokes. Yet this is by no means a simplistic or predictable listen. They go admirably off-piste in texture with the synth pop openings of Brightstar and the sparkling electronica-decorating Now Or Never, like Depeche Mode if they developed a penchant for hyperactive time-signatures.

Even when you think their urge to complicate rhythms is about to tie a song in knots, they seem to emerge with a winning hook. All of which makes you think that Voyager’s journey may only just be starting.